


Elementary Days

by VideoPlay5178



Category: Rooster Teeth/Achievement Hunter/Funhaus RPF
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-01
Updated: 2016-09-01
Packaged: 2018-08-12 10:48:50
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 18,175
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7931770
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/VideoPlay5178/pseuds/VideoPlay5178
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ray always welcomed his new class with a bright, warm smile and promises of a fun year of learning.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Elementary Days

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! Please leave a comment!
> 
> This is a continuation of: http://archiveofourown.org/works/4917904/chapters/11440564
> 
> Like my writing? Check out my other blog: vidparson.tumblr.com

Ray stood from his desk and looked around his classroom with a fond smile. Tiny desks and chairs were neatly lined up in rows. A smart board clung to the chalkboard, the day’s schedule was neatly printed in bright yellow chalk on the small portions of the black board left on either side of the smart board.

A fancy, new projector hung from the ceiling, aimed at the white smart board. He had yet to make the damn thing work. Thankfully, along the other brick wall was another chalkboard he could use until he got the projector working. Give him an old light bulb projector anyday.

Just below the ceiling was a colorful ribbon that went through the alphabet and the numbers up to one hundred. The faux walls had inspirational posters pinned to the blue fabric. His desk was near the entrance, covered in drawings he had been given over the two years he had been a second grade teacher.

In the far corner of the room there were bins of toys and a bookshelf packed with a variety of books. Two massive and extremely comfortable tie-dye bean bags rested on either side of the book shelf.

A rug depicting a city lay on top of the standard blue fuzzy carpet that covered the entire second grade area. Just past the entrance was a wide hallway that lead to the other rooms. The fake walls were just tall enough not to let sound travel.

He smiled at the bright colors and light feeling. He knew that everything would be an absolute mess by the end of the day, but this _was_ the beginning of the school year.

He grabbed the stool that was resting next to his desk and carried the shining wood chair covered in stickers to the front of the room and sat just as the morning bell rang, letting students into the school. He smiled as the second graders trickled into the room in their new clothes, stiff new backpacks on their shoulders.

“Go ahead and find your seats, there’s name tags already there for you,” Ray said, standing and watching the students edge over to the desks. Trifold name tags rested on all of the desks, facing toward the seats. He had hand written each one and each letter was written in a different color. The trifolds were almost the same length as the desktop, blank except for the name.

The kids smiled as they found their names, more children flooding in. He told each new arrival to find their name and hang their backpack on the back of their chair. Once all twenty students were in the room he scooped up another trifold from his desk and went back to the front of the room.

The kids all stared at the name tag he placed on the stool with wide eyes. The tag was old, from his first class and was a little worse for wear. His name was printed in the same font as the kids, although he only had a brown marker at the time. On either side of his name were little drawings of video games characters and scenes from books and movies.

“Alright,” Ray said, smiling as the kids continued to marvel at his tag, “As you can see from the schedule over there,” he pointed at the short list. He had only a few activities for the morning. He’d put the afternoon schedule up during lunch. “The first thing we’re doing is decorating name tags.”

He had the class remove hard plastic pencil holders filled to the brim with markers, crayons, and colored pencils from their desks. “Now, draw anything you love to do on your name tags,” he said, smiling at the rushed click of the cases opening.

The kids chatted quietly with each other, everyone with big bright smiles as they drew and colored. Ray slowly edged around the room, faintly listening to conversations and to the other teacher's droning on about their class rules and what they would be learning. He would get to that, but he had his own fun ways of doing things.

He spoke shortly with each student, pointing out parts of their drawings and asking them about them. He had a few fairly good artists in his class. Once he was fairly certain everyone was more or less done, he went back to the front and picked up his tag, sitting on his stool.

“Alright, so, now. Put all of the markers away and in your desks. Raise both of your hands in the air when you were done,” he said, quickly narrating like a sports commentator when the kids started putting the markers away slowly. The kids giggled and started to race each other.

Ray laughed along once all of the hands were in the air. “Okay, okay, put your hands down. We’re going to go around the room introducing ourselves and talking about one drawing that we drew, okay? I’ll go first.”

Holding his tag up, he pointed to his name and introduced himself as Mr. Ray. He learned when he was a teaching assistant that Mr. Narvaez was too big of a mouthful for some students. Besides, he had a reputation of being that cool teacher who let everyone call him by his first name.

He pointed to a drawing of Waluigi, reminding himself to thank the art teacher, Monty, again for drawing his tag for him. “And this is my favorite character from video games, Waluigi,” he said, poorly mimicking Waluigi’s voice.

The kids giggled, bouncing in their seats as Ray chuckled and set his tag down. “Alright, let’s start here,” he said, coming to stand next to a young girl with fiery red hair pulled back into a neat ponytail. She proudly stood up and told the class her name and pointed to a picture of what looked like a blue tree but was apparently a cat tower. She happily explained that the tower was her favorite cat toy because she could climb the tower and play with her cats.

Mentally noting that she might climb random things, he had the class clap then moved onto the next child. In the middle of the second row of desks was a young boy who just wouldn’t sit still. He was either kicking his legs or wobbling in his seat. He was playing with his tag, eagerly looking at the next student.  

Ray smiled at him when his turn came around. The boy jumped to his feet and nearly tripped when his chair didn’t move back. Ray quickly steadied him, noting the few small laughs he heard. The boy didn’t seem to notice and gave Ray a giant smile.

“Okay, go ahead,” Ray said after he moved his chair back. The boy nodded rapidly pointing to his name that had a crudely written ‘Free’ squished between his first and last name.

“My name is Gavin Free Haywood! My middle name used to be my last name before I was adopted by my dad!” the boy said almost too quickly and with a surprisingly thick British accent. He pointed to a fairly decent drawing of the Union Jack. “I used to live in Great Britain!”

“That’s great, Gavin,” Ray said, ruffling the boy’s messy blond hair. The class clapped as Gavin sat in his chair, smile absolutely massive.

Ray chuckled, but noted the few twisted smiles he saw out of the corner of his eyes as he moved onto the next student. Kids could be as cruel as they could be kind. There was no in between for them. No gray area. He’d have to keep an eye on Gavin.

Once everyone had been introduced he had everyone get up and follow him around the room. He took them on the ‘Museum Tour’ of where everything was in the room before having them sit around one of the bean bag chairs.

Sitting in the bean bag, he scooped up a small pile of books he had resting next to the bag. Each one was about a different subject they would be learning about throughout the year. He told them what each book was about and how they would be learning about what was in each of them.

He had them choose which one he would read first and by lunch he had read all of the books and the kids were both calm and happy. He lined them up and led them to the lunchroom, leaving them with the teachers on duty.

He returned to his eerily quiet classroom with a tired smile. His room was still relatively clean and he got through more than he thought he would. He erased the schedule and wrote down the afternoon plan before gathering up the papers he would be passing out.

When the kids returned, loud and overly excited from recess, he noted that Gavin still wobbled in his chair but was staring hard at his desk, no longer smiling. Frowning, he quickly got the classes attention and chose a few students to pass out papers, starting with Gavin.

Ray smiled when Gavin sat down after his duty with a smile. He had the kids read over his class rules and the materials they would need for the class. A few small placement tests later, he let them have the free time to play.

He sat at his desk, glancing through the tests while keeping one eye on the kids. Tomorrow would start the lessons and real work, but he was happy to let them have one more summery day.

He glanced up when tiny hands pulled at his sleeve. He smiled down at Gavin who was still smiling, but looked more nervous this time. “Mr. Ray? Why do you have all of these pictures on your desk?” he said, rocking from his heel to his toes.

“They’re from students I had in the past,” Ray said, setting the test he had been glancing at down.

“That’s cool, you must be really old!” Gavin said, giggling when Ray wrinkled his nose.

“Hey now,” Ray chuckled, shaking his head. His desk was absolutely covered. He usually got ten drawings a year, including the years he was only an assistant.

“Sorry,” Gavin said, bouncing on his toes, “There’s just a lot!”

“I guess I am old,” Ray sighed, grunting and rubbing his back. He smiled and Gavin laughed at him. “Go and play with the others Gavin.”

“Okay!” Gavin said before rushing off. Ray smiled after him, watching as he asked to join some kids playing with the giant Legos the school let him bring in.

He turned back to the papers and didn’t have to break up one fight. Although, every time he saw Gavin, he was doing something else, occasionally with other students but mainly by himself. 

About fifteen minutes before the final bell releasing the students, Ray had them clean up their messes and get ready to go. He waved as they left, turning back to his room and relaxing when he saw there weren’t many messes he had to worry about.

“It’s going to be a long year,” he sighed as he picked up what toys had been left out and making sure all of the books were back in their proper places.

Ray kept a close eye on all of the kids. They all seemed happy and actually excited to be there. Granted, every time they came in, he had a new game for them to learn how to spell or some science concept. He was big on getting the kids moving, might as well use all of that energy for something.

Everything seemed fine for a week until Gavin came up to him during the end of the day free time with red eyes and snot dripping onto his shirt.

“Gavin? Hey, what’s wrong bud?” Ray said, quickly slipping from his chair to kneel in front of Gavin. He grabbed his large tissue box on the way down, setting the box down and pulling a few tissues free.

Gavin sniffed and rubbed at his eyes as Ray cleaned up the tears and snort. For the first time since meeting Gavin, the little boy had no words. Instead he just pointed at a group of kids that Ray had noted as a close knit group of friends.

Ray frowned and got a clean tissue. He pressed the tissue to Gavin’s nose and told him to blow his nose softly. Gavin took the tissue to wipe his face once he did.

“What happened, Gavin? Did they say something me to you?” Ray said gently, as Gavin hiccupped. Nodding he blew his nose again.

Scowling slightly, Ray hugged Gavin gently before smiling at him. “It's okay. Can you tell me what they told you?”

“They-they told me that b-because my-my dad isn’t my real dad, that-that no one else w-wanted me,” Gavin croaked, more tears welling in his eyes, “A-and that dad just-just puts up with me. A-and that I have a big nose.”

Ray grit his teeth before taking the dirty tissue and handing Gavin a clean one. “They’re wrong, okay? They’re just being mean. Your dad must love you a lot since you’re always talking about him.”

Gavin smiled slightly, wiping at the snot pouring from his nose. “Yeah, he-he’s great!”

“See? Of course he wants you if he’s so great,” Ray said, chuckling when Gavin gave him the same brilliant smile he had at the beginning of the year, “And you don’t have a big nose, it’s a good nose.” He tapped Gavin’s bright red nose and relaxed when he laughed.

Ray kept handing him tissues and occasionally making silly faces until he stopped crying. He stood only to throw the tissues away, glancing over the kids. The group that had teased Gavin were watching with frowns and sneers. Ray could hear them calling Gavin a tattle tale already.

Sighing, he turned with a smile and ruffled Gavin’s hair. “Hey, go get your sketch book,” he said, crouching down to be at Gavin’s height again, “We can play tic-tac-toe.”

“Okay!” Gavin said before rushing off to get his sketch book. Ray stood and picked the tissue box up, keeping an eye on Gavin. None of the kids approached him, even the ones that noticed his still red and puffy eyes.

He frowned as they turned away, talking amongst each other and occasionally glancing at Gavin. A few even laughed. As he sat and Gavin scurried back over to him, sketchbook hugged to his chest, he began to plan a lecture on bullying.

He played tic-tac-toe with Gavin until it was time for everyone to clean up. Gavin lagged behind while the other kids rushed to get to their buses. When Ray crouched down to ask what was wrong, Gavin hugged him tightly before leaving with a big smile and a wave. Ray blinked after him for a moment before chuckling and waving back.

The very next morning, he had a long serious lecture about bullying. The instant a few of the kids turned to look at Gavin, Ray asked them in particular why they thought people were bullies. He asked multiple students not involved to keep them from thinking he was targeting them.

By the end, most of the class looked guilty while the other half looked terribly sad. So, he immediately had them play that day’s learning game to brighten their moods. He was happy to find out from the teachers on recess duty that day that the kids who teased Gavin came up and apologized to him leading to a small pile of hugging and crying kids.

When the school day ended and Ray’s hours of preparing for the next day began, his computer whistled at him. Opening his email, he saw a new email from a James Ryan Haywood. Ray quickly read the email, smiling by the end.

Mr. Haywood was Gavin’s father and he was extremely thankful that Ray had actually helped Gavin. Ray leaned back, smiling with a warm, fuzzy feeling in his stomach. He never got thanked a lot. The school board didn’t care as long as he did his job. The families of the kids never heard much from their kids about what happened during the day.

Ray was thanked at the end of the year like all other teachers. This email was his first really. Smiling, Ray considered how to respond. Should he even respond to something like this?

“It’s no problem, I just did what was right?” Ray mumbled as he leaned over, hands hovering over his keyboard.

After about ten minutes of no ideas, Ray closed out his email and figured he would write something later.

* * *

 

Ray loved being an elementary teacher, he really did. The kids were all cute and innocent, as well as generally well behaved. They hadn’t given him much of a problem for the majority of the year. They were doing really well in classes and even if they struggled they had no trouble coming up to him.

There were no more bullying episodes since his lecture. Gavin, however, would still pad up to him with his sketch book and flip to the pages filled with tic-tac-toe boards. He at least had made friends with the kids who had teased him.

So he enjoyed his days as a teacher, except for the month of October. The school liked to have well rounded students so there was a time set aside specifically for the arts and music every week. One day they would have an art class while the next they would have music. There were gym classes and health classes as well.

Normally, he wouldn’t mind. The kids, especially Gavin, would sometimes tell him all about their art projects and everything the crazy gym teacher would make them do. He rarely ever heard about their music class. They would play instruments and sing songs but they never talked about the songs.

However, every October, the music teacher taught every student in the school a song to memorize how to spell Halloween. The tune was catchy and old, belonging to an entirely different set of words but the music teacher just made up what she taught. The song stuck with most of the kids, which meant the words would worm into their ears. Ear worms among children often meant that they would be sung, constantly.

Ray was slowly gaining a hatred for Halloween just from that damn song.

This school year was no different than the last. Ray didn’t even realize the time of year until his little second graders came back to his room, a few singing the song at the top of their lungs. He had to do a double take at his calendar- twice.

Ray could feel his lips twitch as the kids sang. Gavin was by far the loudest and seemed to know the song the best. Gavin was a surprisingly good speller despite his knack for making up words he swore everyone said in Britain. If not for this song, he would still love Halloween but now he couldn’t even think of anything related to the holiday without knowing how to spell the damn word.

By the end of the day, he was begrudgingly humming that damned song his entire bus ride home. He slammed his apartment door closed and searched Youtube for the first meme song he could think of. Anything to get that dreaded tune out of his head. They were teaching them the song earlier and earlier, they had to be.

He found a ten hour long video of the Nayn Cat song and blasted the entirety of the video as he worked. He happily walked into class the next morning humming the music and was at peace for most of the day until he passed one of his students while they took a test. The girl was singing the song under her breath as she worked on her math problems.

The girl was so focused, little tongue poking past her lips in thought, that Ray couldn’t really be mad that she ruined his mental health. That night he listened to _Happy_ nearly a million times until that was stuck in his head. However, when he stepped into the shower the following morning, _sunshine, she’s here, you can take a break_ , turned into, _H-a- double l-o-w-double e-n_ and Ray had to hum the damn song all the way to work to satisfy his mind.

By the middle of the month, Ray was more than a little tired of the tune. Actually, it took all his will power not to snap at the kids. They seemed to love the song, humming the short melody whenever they could. Ray didn’t really have the heart to tell them to stop. Some of them seemed to focus better when they were humming anyway. He searched for science and history songs to save his sanity and for later use.

When the final bell rang on a long Friday, Ray sighed in relief, dropping into his desk chair. Not only was the tune being sung throughout the entire school, but the entire week had been spent in parent-teacher conferences. He only had two more tomorrow after only one that day and then he was done.

The school liked for parents to be in the loop. This was the middle of the semester conference. There would be another before winter break and then another before spring break. He didn’t mind, although, he wished he didn’t know where their kids got some of their bad habits.

Sighing, Ray rubbed his face and checked the sticky note stuck to the bottom of his monitor. He would be seeing a Mr. Haywood in about ten minutes. “That’s Gavin, right?” He mumbled to himself, opening his grade book.

His email brightened as his computer woke up and he blinked at a familiar name in his inbox. He reopened the email and smiled sheepishly. He had completely forgotten to send a reply to Mr. Haywood.

“Oh well,” he sighed, opening his grade book and glancing over Gavin’s tests. He was a good student. B’s and A’s on the majority of his tests and very well behaved. Unless Mr. Haywood had a problem, there wouldn’t be much for them to talk about.

At the bottom of Gavin’s page in his book were notes from his first grade teacher. The old man had retired last year and apparently wasn’t very good at his job if his students’ lack of basic knowledge was any indication. The old fart had insisted that Gavin had ADHD and Ray shook his head.

There was no doubt that he had told Mr. Haywood that already. At the very bottom was a note stating that Mr. Haywood had taken Gavin to the doctor for a diagnosis but seemed not to be given medication because he was still ‘acting out’.

        Ray sighed, shaking his head, Gavin was performing well in his class and wasn’t a nuisance, so Ray would not repeat the old fart’s suspicions. He closed the page and quickly searched his desk drawers for Gavin’s folder. A few tests rested inside along with a few projects.

Standing from his desk, he dropped the folder onto a short table the janitors brought Ray just for the conferences. He picked the table up and moved the paint covered wood more into the middle of the large space at the back of his classroom. He pulled four chairs from the nearby desks and placed three of them on one side facing the other.

Just as Ray scooped up the folder, glad that this was his only conference for the day, Gavin burst into the room with a giant smile. “Mr. Ray!” he squealed, nearly running head first into Ray’s legs.

“Woah, slow down there Gavin,” Ray laughed, ruffling the kid’s hair. Gavin gave him a toothy smile before rushing back to the door.

Ray looked up and tried not to let his eyes bug out of his head. Mr. Haywood was a very handsome man. He had bright blue eyes and soft blond hair. A slimming gray suit hugged his shoulders and waist, a rainbow tie under a buttoned jacket. A long black coat was folded over his arm. Large hands took Gavin’s tiny ones. A strong jaw and thin lips smiled softly as Gavin started pulling the man into the room.

Swallowing the sudden lump in his throat, Ray smiled and waved to the table. “Hello,” he said, pulling his unfortunately tiny chair out. “Go ahead and take a seat, I’m sorry that the chairs are so small.”

“Thank you,” Haywood said, letting Gavin drag him along. A little boy shorter than Gavin and with wild, curly red hair appeared from behind Mr. Haywood’s pant leg. His arms were tightly crossed and a firm pout was on his lips.

Gavin gave his signature bird squawk before running over and dragging the boy over to the table as well. Mr. Haywood watched them fondly. “Don’t worry about the table,” he said, startling Ray from watching Gavin and his younger brother he always bragged about, “I just hope I don’t break the chairs.”

Ray laughed lightly and smiled at Mr. Haywood. “They’re stronger than they look, trust me,” he said, offering his hand as Gavin and his brother sat, “It’s nice to meet you Mr. Haywood.”

“Ryan’s fine,” Mr. Haywood said, taking Ray’s hand, “It’s good to meet you as well, you’re Gavin’s favorite teacher thus far.”

“Yeah!” Gavin giggled from his seat, his little brother studying Ray with narrowed eyes.

Ray smiled at Gavin, letting Ryan’s hand go. “I’m glad you’re enjoying class,” he said as he crammed himself into his chair.

“Do you think there’s something wrong with Gavvy too?” the boy said, making everyone look at him in shock, even Gavin. Ryan froze, hand on the back of the chair that was dwarfed by his size.

“Boys,” Ryan coughed, giving Ray a nervous smile as he sat, placing his jacket on the table, “Why don’t you go play?”

“Go ahead,” Ray said, nodding toward the inside play area, “Just keep it clean.”

Gavin beamed at them, nearly picking his brother up as he sped off toward the toys. “Yes Mr. Ray!” he called over his shoulder as he pushed his brother into one of the bean bag chairs before showing him some of the toys.

Ryan smiled fondly after them, shifting uncomfortably in the tiny seats. “Sorry,” he sighed, looking back at Ray, “Michael is over protective of Gavin.”

“It’s alright,” Ray smiled at Ryan, opening Gavin’s folder. He had his legs tucked under the tiny chair in a vain attempt to be comfortable. He was more comfortable than Ryan who was lifting the table up awkwardly with his knees. “And for the record, Gavin is a great student, I really enjoy having him in my class.”

Ryan blinked at Ray surprised. “Really?” he said hesitantly, playing with the sleeve of his jacket.

“Of course,” Ray said with a shrugged, glancing through the tests before laying them out in front of Ryan, “He’s attentive and eager to learn and he’s always full of energy and he has these bright ideas.”

Ryan relaxed and smiled at Ray. “Thank you,” he said softly, pulling a few of the papers closer, “I’ve been hearing from his teachers that he has ADHD nearly all his life and that he needs medication - we’ve gone to doctors, but they tell me he’s fine and then the school system got on our case.”

Ray swallowed his heart back down into his chest and forced a polite smile, hoping he wasn’t blushing. “He’s doing well. He draws in class and it seems to help him focus. I don’t know what’s wrong with the school anymore. They keep insisting every kid has a problem, not that there’s anything wrong with kids who did have ADHD,” he shook his head and sighed, “Gavin’s fine and he’s doing fine. You have nothing to worry about.” 

Ryan’s shoulder’s sagged and he gave Ray the most relieved smile he’s seen since he told a pair of parents that their son wasn’t going to repeat a grade. “You have no idea how much that means to me, to him,” he said, running his fingers through his hair.

Ray chuckled and shook his head. “I think I can guess,” he said, gesturing to the papers, “He’s very intelligent and way ahead of some of his peers, do you have him read a lot at home?”

“He really likes his science books,” Ryan chuckled, smiling brightly as he picked up a few papers and grinned at the grades, “I hope you’re not going to tell me I shouldn’t be letting him do that?”

Ray snorted and rolled his eyes. “Of course not, I’m glad he’s so excited to learn more. He really takes charge during class labs,” he said, glancing at Gavin and Michael to make sure they were alright and not making too much of a mess. They were building a tall tower with the giant legos. Michael was hugging the tower while Gavin reached up on his toes to put a piece on the top.

Ryan _beamed_ at Ray before looking over at Gavin and Michael. “I’m glad he’s doing well,” he sighed as the tower wobbled before crashing into the bean bag chair that was dragged over to catch the falling bricks. Michael and Gavin giggled and high-fived before quickly cleaning up their mess.

Ray knew his cheeks were red this time. He tried to calm his pounding heart with a deep breath. No one should look that cute and handsome at the same time. He was just lucky Ryan wasn’t looking at him. “He’s doing very well. I don’t really have any complaints, but is there anything you're worried about?”

Ryan frowned and looked back down at Gavin’s tests. “How’s he doing, socially?” he said, looking back up at Ray, “Does he have any friends? Are those students from the beginning of the year leaving him alone?”

“They’re actually his friends now,” Ray said with a chuckle, “They apologized and befriended him a number of weeks ago. I thought he would have told you all about that.”

“Rarely,” Ryan sighed, relieved, “It’s mostly about the things he’s been doing in class, oh, and that song they’ve been learning lately.”

Ray flinched then cringed when suddenly Gavin and Michael started singing the song as loudly as they could, trying to be louder than each other. Groaning, he dropped his chin to his chest and resisted the urge to cover his ears with his hands. They continued to sing as they put the rest of the Legos away.

Ryan blinked at him in confusion before laughing lightly. “Sorry, I think I caused that,” he said, raising an amused eyebrow as Ray slowly raised his head, “You alright?”

“Fine, fine,” Ray sighed, rubbing his forehead, “I’ve just heard that song every day since the beginning of the month.”

“I know the pain,” Ryan snorted, shaking his head, “Gavin and Michael have both been singing it. They even taught it to me so I could sing it to them at night.”

“I’m so sorry,” Ray deadpanned, smiling when Ryan laughed.

“I feel bad for you,” Ryan said, leaning back and making the tiny chair creak, “You have to hear twenty kids sing it all the time.”

“Every year,” Ray said, grabbing all of Gavin’s tests and placing them back in his folder, “If there isn’t anything else, you can take Gavin’s tests.”

“Alright, thank you,” Ryan said, taking the folder when Ray held it out to him. He moved to stand and paused, biting his lip. “There’s, uh, that Halloween party thing at the end of the month, right?”

“Right,” Ray said, nodding. He pulled his phone out from his slacks pocket and looked at the calendar. “It’s on the thirtieth, why?”

“Do you still need any help with that?” Ryan said awkwardly, shifting in the chair and fiddling with the sleeve of his coat again. If he and Gavin were related by blood, Ray wouldn’t have to wonder where Gavin got his fidgeting tick from. Then again that could definitely be something that was learned. “I know there were signups sent out, but I wasn’t sure if I’d be able to help until now.”

Ray blinked at Ryan in surprise. The older man’s cheeks were stained pink and he was staring hard at the table. His lips twitched into a smile as he quickly stood and grabbed the list off his desk of the things the parents were bringing for the party. “Well, everything is full,” he said, raising an eyebrow when Ryan deflated slightly, “But the party is open to all parents, and I suppose if you would like to come early to help set up, that wouldn’t be a problem.”

Ryan smiled sheepishly at Ray and nodded. “Alright, I’ll do that then. Thank you,” he said, standing and offering his hand to Ray, “Really, thank you.”

Ray smiled gently and took Ryan’s hand in a firm shake. “Of course, if anything comes up, please email me.”

Ryan nodded and then went over to Gavin and Michael, listening to whatever pretend story they were telling each other as he herded them out of the classroom. Before they could get out of the door, Gavin gasped and grabbed Michael’s hand and ran over to Ray.

“Mr. Ray! This is my brother, I hope you’re his teacher next year!” Gavin said, smiling up at Ray.

Ray chuckled and dropped to his knees, ruffling Gavin’s hair. He looked at Michael who was glaring up at him. “I hope I am too,” he said, leaning back slightly and offering Michael his hand.

Michael narrowed his eyes at Ray’s hand before hesitantly placing his tiny palm in Ray’s. Ray shook his hand with wide swings that made Michael stumble and laugh. When Ray let go, Michael seemed to remember that he wasn’t supposed to like Ray and pouted at him again.

Laughing slightly, Ray leaned closer to Michael. “Don’t worry, I don’t think there’s anything wrong with your brother. He’s awesome.” Gavin blushed and puffed his chest up as Michael looked at him wide eyed before giving him a smile that was missing two teeth.

Smiling, Ray leaned back then stood. “Alright boys, your dad’s waiting.”

“Bye Mr. Ray!” Gavin said cheerfully, grabbing Michael’s hand and waving to him as they went back over to Ryan.

Michael gave a small wave as Ray waved back. When he looked up at Ryan, the man was staring at them with this soft fond look that unleashed millions of butterflies into Ray’s stomach. Knowing he was blushing bright red, he watched Ryan take his sons’ hands and lead them out of the room.

Blinking slowly, he wandered over to the table and put the stained wood table back into the corner. He placed the chairs at the desks they came from before dropping into his desk chair, heart bursting from his chest. Taking a deep breath, he tried to push Ryan’s soft smile and that damned song out of his head. He failed on both counts.

* * *

 

The day of the party, Ryan was so early he helped move the tables and chairs around the classroom while Ray finished the lesson for the day. Ray laughed as Ryan smiled sheepishly at him helping when he could.

Once the tables were arranged in a U-shape, and the food and goodie bags were laid out, Ryan sat in the back of the room watching the class. Ray pushed through what little class time he had with what little attention he had from the kids.

He felt the extra pair of eyes on him more than he thought he would. Occasionally he would catch Ryan’s eyes and he tried not to blush when Ryan smiled at him. They only had one big activity and Ray had the kids stand and pulled out a big, round, fluffy bat plushie.

“Alright, you know the rules,” Ray said as the kids giggled at the giant bat, “When you catch the bat, you have to spell the word I tell you, are you ready?”

He got cheers and smiled. He gently tossed the toy to one of the girls and had her spell the first word on their spelling list that came to mind. When each student got the bat at least once, Ray paused the game.

“Okay, now we’re going to do math,” he said, letting Gavin throw the toy to the boy across from him.

He caught Ryan’s eye only once throughout the entire process. He was following the bat with his eyes, chin resting in the palm of his hand. He had a goofy and amused smile on his face as Ray helped one of the girls through the math problem he had given her.

He had them stop the game half an hour before the party was to begin. By now, other parents were arriving and were either talking to each other or on their phones. One other parent was helping Ryan set up the food and utensils that were brought in. He sent kids off in groups to the bathrooms to change, helping a few with their more complicated costumes.

Some kids ran to their parents for help, clinging to their legs or showing them their desks. The parents, for the most part, were mostly in the way. When Ray needed their kid’s attention they would talk over him. When Ray needed the parent’s attention they would ignore him.

As parents continued to trickle in, Ryan directed them around the room and telling them what Ray needed them to know about the parade while Ray told the kids what they needed to do and handed out the small bat toys he promised he would give them for getting A’s on their last few tests.

Ryan was a god sent. Ray was usually alone trying to figure out how to get everything organized. Once everyone was settled and knew what they were doing and when, Ray stood back and let the parents do the puzzle activities he had made with their kids.

He watched over everything with a tired smile. Ray had managed to sneak out for a moment to change into his own costume. His cape fluttered behind him, his mask resting on his desk because he could barely see out of the damn thing.

“Tuxedo mask, huh?” Ryan said, startling Ray. He twisted and saw Ryan smiling at him just a bit behind him.

Ray laughed and shrugged at Ryan. “It’s Halloween, might as well,” he said, tugging at his cape. He had been Tuxedo Mask every year of Halloween. Some of the kids knew what he was referencing, others asked him why he wasn’t Waluigi and he had to agree, why wasn’t he?

“It fits you,” Ryan said, smiling at Ray. They glanced at the crowd before looking at each other again, a force of habit. “Sorry for coming so early.”

“It’s fine,” Ray said, shaking his head, “I really appreciate the help. I’m usually on my own with these things.”

“That must be awful,” Ryan said, shuddering, “I can’t imagine you trying to do all of that by yourself.”

“All part of the job,” Ray shrugged, smiling when Gavin ran over to them, grabbing his father’s hand.

“Dad! Did you ask Mr. Ray yet?” Gavin said, bouncing on his toes. He swung their hands, looking between them with bright blue eyes.

“Ah, no,” Ryan was blushing, focusing on his son who was dressed as a zombie. He had red paint smeared on his cheeks, wearing a purple t-shirt that was stained with dirt and ripped in several spots. Ray vaguely remembered that shirt from the beginning of the year.

“Ask me what?” Ray said, tilting his head to the side and smiling amused as Ryan’s face turned red and Gavin huffed at him before turning to Ray.

“Dad wanted to come early so he could talk to you!” Gavin said cheerfully, not noticing Ryan squeezing his hand and waving his free hand. Ray had a feeling Gavin would probably never notice. “He wanted to ask you on a date!”

“A date, huh?” Ray said, smiling at Ryan who sighed, covering his eyes with his free hand. Even the tips of his ears were turning red now.

“Yeah! Where you hang out and stuff,” Gavin said, rocking from heel to toe, “He asked me and Micoo if it was okay. I think it would be awesome!”

Ray stifled laughter as Ryan let go of Gavin’s other hand to completely hide his face. “Gavin, why don’t you go get a candy bag before all of them are gone,” Ryan croaked between his hands, smiling tiredly at his son.

“Oh yeah!” Gavin gasped, running off into the crowd. He popped back out at the tables, carefully considering the remaining gift bags.

They were silent for a moment as Ray covered his mouth with one hand and his stomach with the other while Ryan continued to hide his face in his hands. Ray tried to keep himself together before bursting out laughing, holding his sides. Ryan’s groan was muffled by his hands. “What a little wingman you have,” Ray snickered, elbowing Ryan in the side, “What does this date entail?”

“A nice diner and maybe a movie while Michael and Gavin are over at a friend’s?” Ryan said, giving Ray a hopeful look from between his fingers, “If you still want to go after that.”

“Change that movie into a video game and you’ve got yourself a date,” Ray said, patting his shoulder. He leaned back in surprise when Ryan smiled brightly at him.

“You game?” Ryan said, letting his arms drop to his sides, the pink fading from his cheeks.

“More than I should,” Ray said with a shrug, heart pounding as a warm feeling filled his stomach.

“Perfect,” Ryan chuckled, giving Ray a soft smile. He opened his mouth to say something else when all of the kids broke out into that damned song suddenly.

Ray and all of the parents tried not to groan, although all of them had identical looks on their faces. Ryan laughed and leaned closer to Ray, singing along softly. Ray blushed and leaned back against Ryan. Maybe he could get used to that song, as long as Ryan was the one singing.

* * *

 

“The rules are basically the same but there’s a new one under work relationships,” the principle droned from the podium in the auditorium. The teacher conferences were boring as hell. They were hours spent with the principle going on and on about minute changes to the rules and upcoming events.

They only happened once a year and the kids had an entire day off for them. Ray leaned back in his chair, head tipped back and eyes closed. Monty elbowed him every few minutes to make sure he wasn’t actually asleep.

“Now, if you look at rule number three, you’ll see we’ve included a new relationship you’re not allowed to participate in,” the principal said, paper rustling in the mic. Ray’s own copy of the rules was flopped on his knees, unopened since he got them at the beginning of the conference. Only a few other pages rustled in the crowd of bored teachers.

“Ray,” Monty hissed, elbowing him hard in the ribs, “Look at your damn book!”

Ray scowled at Monty, peeking over his shoulder. Rule number three of the handbook under work relations. No dating the parents of students you are currently teaching.

Ray paled and gave Monty a panicked look as the principle started to read the rule. Monty pushed his bright white hair out of his face, his leather fingerless gloves catching a few strands.

“You’re going to have to tell him,” Monty whispered, frowning down at the book.

Ray groaned softly, leaning forward and holding his head, elbows resting on his knees. A cute, handsome, awesome guy finally asks him on a goddamn date and he has to tell him no?

Monty sighed and patted Ray’s shoulder as the principle finally concluded his reading of the rules and moved onto the big events that were coming up. Ray tuned him out like he always did, but this time he fidgeted in his seat and glanced at the clock every few seconds.

Monty shook his head when Ray bolted from the room the instant he could; he got his things from his room and went outside. Sitting in the bus stop, breath curling into clouds in front of him, he stared at Ryan’s contact in his phone.

Since the Halloween party they had been texting nonstop whenever they had free time. Two hearts surrounding a skull were next to Ryan’s name and had stayed there since they traded gamer tags and played a few heists together in GTA. Ryan knew a surprising amount of things about murder.

His thumb hovered over the call button as he settled into his coat, backpack leaning up against his leg. He had some time before the bus would arrive and he knew he couldn’t spend most of that time staring at his phone.

Deep sighing, he pressed the call button and pressed his phone to his ear. The line hadn’t even finished ringing once before Ryan picked up. “Hey Ray, are you finished with your meeting?”

Ray bit his lip and curled his free hand into a fist in his pocket. “Yeah, uh. We finished just a few minutes ago,” he pushed out, closing his eyes and leaning back on the bench. He leaned against the glass behind him, letting his head thump back.

“That’s good, so you’ll be coming early?” Ryan said, pots and pans clanging together in the background.

Ray wrinkled his nose and scowled. “I’m sorry Rye, I can’t,” he said, gritting his teeth as absolute silence echoed over the phone, “I-it’s not you or me even, it’s the fucking school.” He rushed out.

“What- do you mean?” Ryan said, voice soft and suddenly really goddamn sad.

Ray sighed and opened his eyes to scowl at the filthy ceiling of the bus stop. “They added a new rule to the teacher handbook, no dating the parents of the students you’re currently teaching. I’m sorry, I-I kind of want to break the stupid ass rule bu-“

“Oh no, you need your job,” Ryan interrupted before sighing, “I-I kind of wish you could break it too.”

Ray smiled sadly as snow started slowly floating from the sky. “You made diner didn’t you?” he said after a long silence.

Ryan chuckled awkwardly, the click of an oven echoing over the line. “Yeah I-I did. Homemade chicken mac-and-cheese. I didn’t really know what else to make and I figured you would like that.”

“Sounds fucking great,” Ray said, pushing himself off of the glass wall to watch the snow. He watched a flake land and melt into the ground as silence consumed them again.

“Ray, is- there’s nothing in the rules against being, friends with parents, is there?” Ryan said carefully.

Ray sat up straighter, smiling slowly. “No, I don’t think there is,” he said, glancing at his backpack. He quietly yanked the rule book out and glanced at the work relations section again.

“Then there shouldn’t be a problem if we, as friends, hung out and played video games,” Ryan said and Ray could almost hear him smile.

“And if you just so happened to make something fucking delicious for dinner, then that’s nobody's business,” Ray said, shooting a glare at the new rule before glancing over the other two. Absolutely nothing about making friends.

“You haven’t even tasted it yet,” Ryan laughed as Ray snapped the paper book closed.

“I don’t need to,” Ray said, stuffing the book into his bag and bending some of the pages, “I’d say it was great no matter what it tasted like. Sides, it has to be better than the frozen dinners I’ve been eating.”

“Well aren’t you polite,” Ryan snorted, probably rolling his eyes as well, “So, are you still coming?”

“Sure thing guy pal, bro, buddy pal,” Ray said laughing as Ryan groaned.

“Seriously?” Ryan chuckled, more ticking and clicking in the background.

“Of course buddy o’ pal o’ mine,” Ray said, zipping up his bag before shrugging the strap onto his shoulder, “I’ll be there in a couple minutes.”

Ryan didn’t say anything for a moment, amused chuckling wrapping around Ray and promising that being friends was going to be the hardest thing he has ever done. “Alright, see you soon,” he said before hanging up.

Ray smiled like an idiot, staring down at his phone for a moment before texting Monty their solution. He snorted when he got a text back stating that he already sounded like a love sick puppy.

Rolling his eyes, Ray stuffed his phone into his pocket and rocked on his feet. He almost felt like Gavin as the bus came and he sat bouncing slightly.

Ryan’s house was small but looked warm and safe. Ray smiled at the house from next to the mailbox. The snow was slowly piling up on the roof and lawn, the bushes lining the front of the house lightly dusted. Warm light spilled from large picture windows.

Taking a deep breath and shuddering from the cold, he walked up to the house and pressed the doorbell. He heard the rapid thud of feet and laughed when Ryan pulled the door open and smiled brightly at him.

Ray took in Ryan’s comfortable t-shirt and sweats with an amused smile. “Glad you could come,” Ryan said softly before letting Ray into the house.

The smell of diner hit Ray right in the face as Ryan closed the door. He pulled his dress shoes off and set them aside as Ryan padded toward the kitchen and waited for him in the doorway.

Shoes off and backpack resting on the ground next to them, Ray looked up and found Ryan staring at him. Their eyes met and the same look of longing crossed their faces before they both forced smiles.

“This is going to suck,” Ray declared softly as he sat next to Ryan who was leaning against him fast asleep, controller dangling from his fingers. The kitchen was cleaned up from dinner and drinks littered the coffee table in front of them.

Ray let his own controller go limp in his hands as he looked at the time on the TV box. He hadn’t stayed up to one in the morning with another person in a long time. Letting his head drop back against the back of the couch, he closed his eyes and enjoyed the warmth of Ryan’s head resting against his shoulder.

* * *

 

Ray’s plastered on smile made his cheeks ache as he listened to the parents of one of his more troublesome students prattle on. The sheer amount of politically incorrect things pouring out of his mouth made Ray want to punch him, but he kept himself in check. He really hated parent teacher conferences.

The man’s wife was red faced and staring at the table with a look that could murder. Her purse was creaking with the death grip she had on the handle. If Ray recalled correctly from the few times the student had come up to him crying, they were about to get a divorce.

Ray glanced at the door when he heard the soft patter of small feet and the thud of much larger ones. He nodded to Ryan as he and his sons emerged around the fake wall. He waved for them to go over to the play area.

Ryan nodded and herded the boys over to the corner, just catching Gavin before he could tackle Ray in a hug. “Mr. Smith, as interesting as that is, you are here about your daughter’s grades,” he said, pushing the folder in his hands towards the man’s wife, “Let’s focus on that, yes?”

He faintly heard Ryan chuckle at him and tried to relax some. The wife asked about a million questions about her daughter’s behavior and Ray happily answered them. He ignored the father’s inquiries about what exactly he was teaching the kids in history class.

When the couple finally left, Ray leaned forward until his head rested against the table. He despised parent-teacher conferences. Sighing, he sat up and looked over at Ryan, Gavin, and Michael, a red circle slowly lightening on his forehead.

He blinked when he saw Ryan sitting in the bean bag chair in his fancy suit, Michael and Gavin sitting on his knees and leaning back against his arms as he held one of the books open. The boys took turns reading the pages softly. Michael read slower than Gavin, pouting when he got caught on a word.

Ryan gently helped him through the words. Occasionally, Gavin would point at a picture and ask Ryan something with that big, goofy, innocent grin he had. Michael would giggle when Ryan started answering.

Heart melted slightly, Ray stood from his tiny chair with a fond smile. Ryan had invited Ray over multiple times as a friendly get together. Occasionally Michael and Gavin would be there and he would play with them for a bit before they were whisked away by one friend or another for a sleepover.

Trying to shake the warmth pooling in his chest, he went to his desk and got Gavin’s folder. He had only been approached twice by other teachers and administrators asking about his relationship with Ryan. Every time he reassured them that they were just friends and if he told them they met on X-box before school even started, well, no one could call him out.

He set Gavin’s folder down on the table and walked over to them in time to catch Gavin’s question. “What if your legs didn’t know they were legs?” he said with a sudden gasp, looking down at his own legs, little feet kicking slightly.

Ryan’s smile was torn between amusement and a deep sigh. “Well, you see, Gavin,” he said, pausing when Ray sat in front of him.

“Your brain controls your legs, right?” Ray said, smiling when Gavin looked at him with his big blue eyes, “And your brain knows your legs are legs, so of course your legs know that they’re legs.”

Gavin gasped and looked down at his feet, kicking them gently. Michael giggled and slipped from Ryan’s leg to sit in Ray’s lap, leaning his back against him. “Yeah Gavvy,” he said, arms folded and nodding.

Ray laughed and ruffled Michael’s hair as Ryan gave him a thankful smile. Ray peaked at the book Ryan was holding and chuckled. “ _The Little Engine that Could_?”

“It’s Gavin’s favorite,” Ryan said as Gavin cheered, throwing his arms in the air and nearly punching Ryan in the chin.

“I like _Where the Wild Things Are_!” Michael said pouting when Gavin stuck his tongue out at him.

“I think I have that too,” Ray said, holding Michael still as he leaned over and scanned the shelves of the book shelf. Smiling he pulled the book out and handed the rough pages to Michael.

Ryan chuckled as Michael’s eyes widened as he ran his small, pudgy fingers over the cover. He made sure Gavin had a secure hold on his book before standing and setting him on the bean bag. Ray stood and set Michael down as well before leading Ryan to the table.

“So, how’s he doing?” Ryan said as he sat awkwardly on the tiny chair.

“Good like always,” Ray said as he sat himself, knees creaking as he sat. He winced and sighed as Ryan pressed his lips into a thin line to keep from laughing. “I hate these chairs.”

“Well, they weren’t meant for grown men,” Ryan said taking the folder Ray slid over to him, “How many more conferences do you have?”

“After this, three tomorrow and three the day after and then I’m done,” Ray said, watching Ryan flip through Gavin’s tests and projects.

Ryan nodded, smiling at all of the good grades. “Well, you’re almost done,” he said, glancing up at Ray before looking back down again.

“Almost,” Ray snorted, resting his cheek on his palm. Ryan smiled at him and Ray felt those butterflies escape from the cage he had made for them.

“So, anything I should be worried about?” Ryan said as he ordered the papers and closed the folder.

“Nothing I’ve noticed or that Gavin’s told me,” Ray sighed, running his hand through his hair, “Any questions?”

“Nope, he’s happy and hasn’t complained about anyone,” Ryan said, smiling at Ray, “Oh wait, I do have one question.”

“Is this is some lame attempt to ask me to come over?” Ray said, snorting when Ryan blushed lightly and shrugged.

“Maybe,” Ryan mumbled, sighing when Ray laughed lightly at him, “Did it work?”

“Maybe, depends on what we’re doing,” Ray said, leaning back in his chair.

“What we usually do,” Ryan said with a shrug, running his finger over the edge of the tab sticking out from the folder.

“Then yes, it worked,” Ray said butterflies multiplying when Ryan beamed at him.

A throat cleared from the doorway and they both jumped. Their heads snapped to the doorway where Monty stood leaning against the fake wall with a smirk. “Ready to go home yet, Ray?” he said, eyes flickering between them, “Or did you find another ride?”

Ray blushed and rolled his eyes. “No, you’re still driving me home,” he said, standing.

Ryan awkwardly stood too fast, knocking his chair over. Monty snorted and laughed as they blushed more, avoiding looking at each other. “You two have it _bad_ ,” he said before disappearing around the wall.

“Good to see you too, Monty!” Ryan called after him, laughing when Monty’s hand appeared to wave at them before disappearing. Monty occasionally went with Ray and Ryan to the movies or other outside the house outings so that if they ran into anyone from the school, they wouldn’t get in trouble.

“At least you don’t have to hear him complain about the great sacrifice he’s made going out with us,” Ray said, shaking his head as Ryan righted his chair.

Ryan snorted and rolled his eyes before standing upright. “We do owe him one.”

“Oh no, don’t let him hear you say that,” Ray gasped, quickly looking at the door, “He’ll never let us hear the end of it.”

Ryan laughed and smiled at Ray before turning toward his boys. Ray sighed and watched them for a moment, trying to stuff his butterflies back into their cage. Tearing his eyes away, he picked up the table and moved the fake wood back in the corner before replacing the chairs at the desks.

When he turned around Gavin nearly kneecapped him trying to hug him. “Bye Mr. Ray!” Gavin said bouncing on his toes, hugging Ray’s legs and smiling up at him.

“Bye Gavin, see you tomorrow,” Ray said, ruffling Gavin’s hair. He nearly jumped when another small body hugged him and Michael pouted up at him.

Chuckling, Ray crouched down and hugged both boys before watching them run back over to Ryan who waved before taking their hands. Ray watched them leave as Monty slipped into the room.

“You’re disgusting,” Monty said with a crooked smile.

Ray shot Monty a glare as he walked over to his desk. “Shut up,” he huffed, slipping folders of tests into his backpack.

“Sorry,” Monty said with a sheepish smile, “When you can finally date him and need romantic ideas, I’m your guy.”

Ray snorted and laughed lightly. “Thanks, asshole,” he said, slinging his backpack onto his shoulder.

Monty shrugged and smirked, laughing when Ray pushed his shoulder. When he got home, his phone buzzed with texts from Ryan. Smiling to himself, he happily texted back before sitting on his couch for a couple of hours of grading.

* * *

“Mr. Ray, can you be our third grade teacher?”

The question actually made him freeze. The last week of school was always crazy. Most of his free time when the kids were at recess or gone for the day had gone to taking apart his classroom. Now, on the last day of school, all of the walls stood bare. Their play corner was gone, stowed away in Ray’s apartment until the next year.

The desks were mostly cleaned out, the kids backpacks near bursting with all of their supplies they had left in their desks for the year. The projector he had finally figured out was gone for the school to replace them with a newer, better model.

The girl who had asked the question still had her hand raised as the entire class looked at him intently. He blinked back, mouth falling open as his mind quickly ran through his options. “I’m afraid I can’t,” he said slowly, frowning when many pairs of eyes started to water, “I wish I could, but I’m only a second grade teacher.”

There was one sniff and then every single one of the kids seemed to burst into tears at once. Ray’s heart broke as he crouched and waved for them to get up. He hugged every single one of them before making them sit and passing out tissues.

“Mr. Ray,” Gavin sniffed, coming up to him with a giant poster board in his hands, “We made this for you, to add to your desk!” He pointed at Ray’s desk which seemed smaller now that there weren’t a bunch of drawings taped to the sides.

Ray blinked at the poster before taking the board from Gavin. He unfolded the white paper and nearly started crying himself. The poster was divided into small, neat boxes. In each box was a drawing done by each of his twenty students, their names written as neatly as possible under each drawing.

Biting his lip as he smiled to keep from actually crying, he folded the poster again and smiled down at Gavin then at the rest of the class. “Thank you,” he said softly, walking to his desk and opening the poster again. He balanced the poster on his desk, before turning back to his class to finish the last few lessons.

At the end of the day, the kids voted for Ray to read them one last story. As he saw them off, he felt pretty damn proud of all of them. They were leaving his classroom with a newfound love for learning and that’s all he wanted. That was why he became a teacher.

As he left at the end of the day, he hugged the poster to his chest and pulled his phone from his pocket. “Hey Ray,” Ryan said after the second ring, “How was the last day of school? Gavin and Michael haven’t gotten off the bus yet.”

“Your kid is fucking adorable,” Ray blurted, laughing as he sat at the bus stop.

“Ah, they gave you the poster?” Ryan said, the roar of a bus echoing behind him.

“It was Gavin’s idea, wasn’t it?” Ray said, looking down at the poster.

“Yep, he begged me to invite his entire class to the house to draw on it,” Ryan said, voice soft and gentle, “But don’t let them know I told you that.”

Ray laughed and let his head smack against the glass wall behind him. He smiled to himself for a long moment listening to Ryan greet Michael and Gavin. He could hear their tiny voices faintly.

“Hey Rye, it’s summer,” Ray whispered, closing his eyes, “I’m no longer Gavin’s teacher.”

There was silence for a moment besides Michael and Gavin talking rapidly. “Yeah, you’re right,” Ryan whispered, and Ray could almost see his smile slowly growing as he held Michael and Gavin’s hands.

Ray grinned and laughed mainly to himself. He heard Ryan chuckle. He could barely hear Gavin ask who Ryan was talking to when Michael shouted. “Hi Mr. Ray!”

Ray cracked up as Ryan sputtered, no doubt blushing. “I’ll call you back,” Ray said between laughs as Gavin started shouting as well.

“Talk to you later!” Ryan said before the line went dead. Ray stayed still, phone still pressed to his ear.

Later that night, his phone startled him out of the dazed stare he had at his TV. His brain was still processing that he didn’t have to go to work tomorrow or for the rest of the summer. He’d have to find another job, now that he was thinking. There was no way he was going to be able to pay the bills with what he had saved over the past school year, sadly.

He blinked at his phone then dived for the device when he saw Ryan’s picture smiling at him. “Hello?” he breathed after he fumbled with the phone trying to answer.

“You okay?” Ryan said and Ray blushed, “You sound like you just ran a marathon and you hate running.”

“You just startled me, that’s all,” Ray snorted, sitting up from where he was laying on his stomach on the couch. Glancing at the TV box he smiled slightly. “Boys asleep?”

“They just went to bed,” Ryan said softly as Ray leaned back against his couch, “So, now that you’re free from the school rules, do you want to go on a date that we can actually call a date?”

Ray snorted and muted the TV. “Hell, _yes,_ ” he said, grinning when Ryan laughed.

“Maybe a dinner out?” Ryan said, something tapping in the background, “Without Monty, of course.”

“He’d slap me if I so much as mentioned doing so,” Ray said, staring at the ceiling, “We’d go to the diner, right?”

“Of course,” Ryan snorted, eye roll nearly audible, “Where else could we possibly go.”

“Listen, I like their burgers,” Ray said, stretching his legs out in front of him, “We could go to my other favorite restaurant.”

“I am not taking you to Taco Bell,” Ryan sighed, bumping his phone as he raised his hand to pinch the bridge of his nose, “And that’s hardly a restaurant.”

“Don’t you insult Taco Bell,” Ray gasped, placing his hand over his heart. He smiled when Ryan groaned. “So, when?”

“Well, we could do it Saturday since you have a couple of workdays,” Ryan sighed, the TV humming faintly.

“Fuck yeah,” Ray said before suddenly gasping, “Ryan! I can curse whenever I want!”

“Yes Ray, you can curse,” Ryan snorted before laughing.

Ray grinned at the ceiling, closing his eyes and listening to Ryan talk softly about whatever came to mind.

* * *

 

“Did I ever tell you how I got Michael and Gavin?” Ryan said in the middle of a dinner date one night. Michael and Gavin were off at a friend’s, giving them a night to themselves for the first time in awhile.

Ray blinked up at Ryan from across the table, fork still in his mouth after he bit down on the fucking delicious stake Ryan had made them. He shook his head, quickly chewing and swallowing most of his bite. “No, I don’t think so,” he said before taking a sip of his Red Bull to get down the rest of the food in his mouth.

Ryan pursed his lips and nodded, looking down at his plate, fork and knife pointed straight up in his hands. Ray watched him for a long moment hesitantly eating more as Ryan’s brow furrowed.

Sighing, Ryan slowly started to eat himself. Ray stayed quiet, watching him closely. Ryan’s eyes were glazed over as he slowly chewed his diner. Ray finished first and sipped at his Red Bull as Ryan took his last few bites.

“I was married to a woman,” Ryan said as he placed his silverware down on his plate, “She was great when we dated, great when we were married, then something seemed to snap in her when she couldn’t get pregnant.”

Ray frowned and leaned back in his seat as Ryan stared hard at the center of the table. “She’d always been a perfectionist and I knew it was because of her mother. God, her mother,” he snorted, scowling, “She was a crazy woman. Nothing she did was good enough. She spent her entire life trying to please that woman.”

Ryan looked up at Ray and smiled tiredly at him. “And when she couldn’t get pregnant? The one thing her mother said would make her useful, she was in her own personal hell.” He sighed and looked back down at the table. “Her mother’s abuse and her own obsession with being perfect made her lash out at the rest of us. Me, her brother.”

Ryan shifted in his seat, jaw tightening as he clenched his jaw. Ray hesitantly reached out and rested her hand palm up on the table. He gave Ryan a soft smile when he looked at him. Ryan tensed then reached out and took his hand.

They sat in silence for a moment, Ryan’s grip on Ray’s hand slowly tightening. “Eventually, I suggested adopting,” Ryan whispered, staring at their hands, “She was fucking pissed until I suggested we make her mother think she was pregnant. She went crazy with the idea, spent hundreds on high scale costumes to fool her mother.”

Ryan’s right eye twitched and he shifted in his seat again, eyes glazing over. “We spent those nine months where she acted like she was actually pregnant – she was cruel, just goddamn awful – trying to get a baby adopted.”

“We finally got Gavin, his parents couldn’t afford to take care of him and we were the only people looking to adopt him so we got him,” Ryan said, his fingers nearly crushing Ray’s, eyes turning red, “And then everything was fine. She was happy, everything was back to normal, and her mother left us alone.”

Ray hesitantly stood and rounded the table as Ryan raised his free hand to rub his eyes. “Then Gavin got older and she couldn’t take it. I caught her shaking his crib, yelling at him until he was sobbing. His diaper was full because she refused to change him and apparently she hadn’t fed him either.”

Ryan paused again, shaking slightly as Ray held onto his hand. Grinding his teeth, he hugged Ryan’s head to his chest and ran his fingers through short blond locks. “Fighting in court was hell,” Ryan spat once he collected himself, cheeks wet and eyes redder, “We had to convince the court that she was an unfit mother, how we won is beyond me.” He took a deep breath and looked up at Ray, smiling faintly, “I raised Gavin and when he was in Kindergarten he came home and asked me for a baby brother and, honestly, I can’t say no to him. The first place I looked I found Michael, born and raised in the system. They were happy to hand him over and it’s just been us three since.”

Ray smiled at Ryan, running his fingers through his hair and tracing the bones in his face. Ryan closed his eyes and leaned into Ray’s hands. “And then you showed up with your cute face and your fucking amazingness, and I don’t mean just at video games.”

Ray laughed and kissed Ryan’s forehead, wiping the tears from his cheeks. He studied Ryan’s face for a moment, taking in the patchy redness around his eyes and the soft smile on his lips.

Ray kissed him on the lips before peppering more kisses all over his face. Ryan laughed and wrapped his arms around Ray’s waist. “I love you,” Ryan sighed, opening his eyes and looking between Ray’s.

Ray stared at him wide eyed before kissing him on the lips again. “I love you too,” he breathed, resting their foreheads together.

Ryan laughed and closed his eyes again. They spent the night tucked as close together as they could be on the bed, talking softly and snuggling closer. They fell asleep with Ray hugging Ryan’s head to his chest.

* * *

 

“Ah! I am slain!” Ryan gasped, flopping on the ground, arms and legs spread out, and tongue hanging from his mouth as his head rolled to the side, eyes closed.

“We killed the monster!” Michael cheered as he and Gavin missed a high five. Michael pushed the plastic knight helmet up awkwardly, face red from laughing. Gavin had the rest of the knight’s outfit on, foam sword tight in his other hand.

“But you forgot, about, the. Second. One!” Ray said, snatching both boys up and spinning them in the air slowly.

Michael and Gavin squealed and laughed, holding onto Ray as Ryan watched them, still laying on the floor.

“Gavvy! The sword!” Michael shouted, holding on tightly to Ray’s neck.

“Oh yeah!” Gavin gasped, swatting Ray’s chest with the sword.

“Gak!” Ray gasped, dropping to his knees. He set the boys down as he flopped on top of Ryan, smirking when a puff of air escaped him.

“We’re the best knights!” Gavin shouted, laughing as Michael hugged him while giggling.

Ray and Ryan shared glances and smiles. Ray leapt up and scoped Michael up into his arms while Ryan grabbed Gavin. Both boys dissolved into giggles as they were tickled.

Ray and Ryan dropped to the floor, leaning up against each other, the boys in their laps. All four of them breathed heavily, smiling faintly.

“Again!” Gavin said, sitting up and smiling brightly up at them. Michael nodded quickly, the helmet falling completely from his head.

“In a minute,” Ryan chuckled, ruffling their hair, “We’re old.”

“Speak for yourself,” Ray snorted, hugging Michael who hugged him back, “I am tired through.”

Ryan snorted and shook his head as Ray smirked up at him. The boys giggled and leaned against them, faces finally returning to a normal color. Both boys might be too old for games like this anymore, but they still enjoyed them regardless. Neither Ray nor Ryan could say no to them either.

Ray felt his phone buzz in his pocket and set Michael on Ryan’s lap as he sat up and grabbed his laptop from the side table. Ryan listened closely as Gavin explained their next grand adventure before getting sidetracked by the Legos Ryan casually reminded him were still scattered across the floor.

Ray watched them over the top of his laptop as the screen lit up. He quickly opened his email and froze. He stared at his laptop blankly. He didn’t flinch as Gavin squawked as Ryan tickled him or when Michael climbed the couch to sit next to him. He could barely breathe when Michael leaned over and looked at the email glaring at him.

Michael gasping made Ryan and Gavin freeze. They looked at him from the floor, Gavin collapsed on top of Ryan who was ignoring the small Legos digging into his back from the set scattered all over his living room floor.

“Ray’s going to be my teacher!” Michael shouted, giving Gavin and Ryan a massive smile.

Gavin gasped and scrambled to his feet and ran over to Michael as he slid from the couch. As the boy’s talked over each other, Ryan slowly stood and walked over. He dropped onto the couch next to Ray and slipped the computer from his lap, letting his hands frozen over the keyboard fall into his lap.

Closing the computer, he set the laptop on the side table before wrapping his arm around Ray’s shoulder and pulling him to lean against his side. The boys continued to talk rapidly quickly getting distracted by their toys and playing.

Ray leaned against Ryan with his eyes glazed over. He had two weeks before he and Ryan had to break up because Ray wanted to keep his job and a few teachers knew they were dating.

Ryan pressed gentle kisses against Ray’s temple until he was breathing again. They pushed themselves through the rest of the day until the kids were put to bed. They sat silently on the couch, the TV nearly silent in the background.

“We can just, do what we did before,” Ryan said carefully, turning his entire body to face Ray, “We’ll just explain it to the kids and just do what we did before.”

“Monty will be pissed,” Ray croaked, forcing himself to smile at Ray.

“Oh Ray,” Ryan breathed, pulling Ray into his lap.

Curling in on himself, he fisted his fingers in Ryan’s shirt and pressing his face into his shoulder. He almost felt like he was in high school again, listening to the first person he ever loved tell him that they wanted to take a break just so they could date the next person on their list.

“Only one more school year,” Ryan said softly into Ray’s hair as he rocked gently back and forth.

“I don’t want to wait on more year,” Ray hissed, clenching his jaw, “I just want this, every day.”

Ryan sighed and rested his cheek against the top of Ray’s head. “I know,” he sighed, holding Ray tighter.

Ray sniffed and closed his eyes. He couldn’t ask for Michael to be removed from his class, that not only might break his little heart but he knew Michael also needed the help. Much like Gavin, his previous teachers wrote him off as a problem child with ADHD.

He leaned into the fingers combing through his hair and rubbing his back and tried to relax. Only two weeks to spend in the place he was the happiest. He’d go back to his dark and cold apartment with no Ryan to snuggle late at night. With no warm breakfast waking him up along with two excited boys bouncing on the bed. No warm hugs from Michael and Gavin. No dizzying kisses from Ryan. If being ‘just friends’ was hard as fuck before, now that he had tasted how happy all of them could be, he was tempted to just say screw the school and find a new place to teach.

However, the next nearest Elementary school was hours away and he still couldn’t do that to Michael. Over the two weeks, he moved most of his things that ended up in the Haywood home back to the apartment he still begrudgingly owned.

When he brought a bag of his clothes home, he found multiple shirts and hoodies that were too big to be his and he knew for a fact he hadn’t packed himself. He also noticed a few of his shirts were missing.

Blushing faintly and smiling, he pulled on the first oversized hoodie he found and hugged the soft, old fabric around him. He pressed his nose into the hood and took a deep breath. Most of his things already smelt like the Haywood home, but the hoodie smelled distinctly like Ryan, the sharp smell of Earth mixed with the tang of leather and wood.

Smiling, Ray hugged the hoodie to him for a moment longer before unpacking the rest of his clothes. He left many of his games at Ryan’s place since their game nights would not be ending. Otherwise, minus a few shirts Ryan wouldn’t own up to having but would blush if they were mentioned, there was nothing left of Ray in the house.

“They don’t necessarily understand, but they know they can’t talk about us dating,” Ryan whispered the night before school started. Ray was on his couch in Ryan’s hoodie, staring blankly at his TV. “They’re upset that you won’t be around until the school year is over.”

“I’m pissed to,” Ray scowled, balling the long sleeves of the hoodie in his fist, “And I can’t even curse!”

Ryan laughed lightly but they both felt how empty everything felt. Ray looked down at his knees which were pulled up to his chest. “Good thing I don’t have any more kids,” Ryan said, forcing a chuckle, “Or we risk doing this a third time.”

Ray closed his eyes and forced himself to smile. He learned in community college that if he smiled more he eventually could fool even himself into believing he was happy. “That would be hell, but not their fault.”

“Oh, of course not,” Ryan said, the line crackling before they both were completely silent for a moment, “God I miss you.”

“I miss you too Rye,” Ray sighed, closing his eyes and resting his chin on his knees, “But, we can do this.”

Ryan was quiet for a moment before he grunted. “Yeah, we can.”

* * *

 

Ray stood from his desk and looked around his classroom with a faint, fond smile. Tiny desks and chairs were neatly lined up in rows. A smart board clung to the wall, the holes where a chalkboard used to be marking the walls. The day’s schedule was neatly printed in bright orange dry erase marker on a small white board he had hanging next to the smart board.

A fancy, new projector hung from the ceiling, aimed at the white smart board. He had yet to make the damn thing work. Unfortunately, both of the rooms chalk boards were gone so he had another larger white board on the large blank wall. Ryan had snatched the board from his office since they were going to throw the board out.

Near the ceiling was a colorful ribbon that went through the alphabet and the numbers up to one hundred. The fake walls had inspirational posters pinned to the blue fabric. His desk was next to the entrance, covered in drawings he had been given. A massive poster of drawings covered most of the front of his desk while other drawings fought for space around the sides.

In the far corner of the room were bins of toys and a bookshelf packed with a variety of books. Two massive and extremely comfortable tie-dye bean bags rested on either side of the book shelf. Both chairs were a little worse for wear, colors duller than the year before.

Another carpet depicting a city rested on top of the new black stiff carpet the covered the entire second grade area. Just past the entrance was a wide hallway that lead to the other rooms. The fake walls were just tall enough not to let sound travel.

He smiled tiredly at the bright colors, ignoring the heavy stone in his stomach. He knew that everything would be an absolute mess by the end of the day, but this _was_ the beginning of the school year. This year he had a new fear, however, what if someone picked up that he was particularly fond of Michael? What if the other kids noticed? He was a teacher, he couldn’t have favorites.

Forcing himself to take a deep breath, he grabbed his stool and name tag and went to the front of the room. Michael might feel like his son, but his other students were just as important. He would do anything to do what was right by them.

He smiled as the bell rang and his students started to trickle into the room with their new, squeaky shoes and backpacks loaded down with supplies. He told them to find their names, familiar, long name tags on each of the twenty five desks.

When Michael came in, he gave Ray a giant smile before hurrying to do what he was told. Ray’s shoulders sagged as he smiled back, chuckling when Michael instantly returned to his normal pout he faced most of the world with.

Like every year, he guided his students through the first day with a light heart. The longer the day went, the easier falling into his old pattern became. If he ruffled Michael’s hair when no one but him was paying attention, no one could call him out.

At the end of the day as he waved to his students, Monty slipped into his room and gave him a sad smile, jingling his keys. “Need a ride?” he said, patting Ray’s shoulder when he nodded slowly.

Days progressed slower than normal, but game nights were far too fast. He always came just before Michael and Gavin went off to their friend’s home. He would play with them and hug them tightly before they left. Then, when Ray and Ryan were left alone, they had to force themselves to sit as far from each other as possible.

By the end of the night, they would give up and Ray would find himself comfortably tucked under Ryan’s chin, the older man fast asleep under him. Closing his eyes, Ray would listen to Ryan’s heart and let himself be lulled to sleep.

Behind closed doors, they found they could do whatever they want as the year went. Ray didn’t move back in since he was expected to be living in his apartment and would get important letters mailed there and the school would call his landline if they needed him. Not to mention, other kids and families from the school lived in Ryan’s neighborhood and since there were laws stating that he couldn’t be in the house with kids he taught, he settled for rare date nights that moved to his apartment after one too many close calls with Ryan’s new neighbors.

Dates out and just seeing both Michael and Gavin outside of the school were short lived moments that left Ray feeling a bit empty. He was ecstatic that he could still spend time with Ryan, but he missed Gavin’s random questions and Michael’s insistence to beat him at some type of game. He missed playing the monster. He missed his turn to read the bedtime story and then listen to Ryan sing a few songs with the boys before tucking them in. He missed kissing their foreheads goodnight.

However, half way through the year, Ray was feeling pretty good with how fast time was moving. They survived through one awkward parent teacher conference and another one was due soon. They could actually do this.

Then Michael was lead into his room by one of the other teachers by his arm bloodied and bruised.

“Michael? What happened?” Ray gasped, leaping from his desk and kneeling down to look over the bruise darkening on Michael’s cheek and the cuts oozing blood on his knee.

“He got in a fight with some other students,” the teacher huffed, grip tight on Michael’s arm, “Take him to the office, I have to get back outside.”

Ray scowled at her and gently took Michael’s arm when she let go. He leaned around the entrance to his classroom to make sure she had left before hugging Michael tightly. “Ah, Mikey, what happened?” he said softly looking Michael’s face over again.

Michael sniffed and wiped at the blood dripping from his split lip with his fist. “Some kids were picking on my friend,” he huffed, folding his arms and puffing his chest up, “I told them to stop and one pushed me so I punched him.”

“And they beat you up,” Ray sighed, carefully running his fingers through Michael’s hair, knocking dirt from his red locks.

Michael nodded once, pouting. Ray smiled slightly and stood, grabbing a few tissues from his desk and having Michael hold them against his lips. “Come on, let’s get you to the office.”

Once in the principal’s office, Ray explained what little he knew while the nurse cleaned and bandaged Michael’s knees. She gave him an icepack for his swelling eye before handing him a lollipop.

Ray chuckled as Michael ate his candy glaring at the principal. “Well, Michael, why didn’t you get a teacher when you saw your friend being bullied?” the principal said slowly.

“I did!” Michael huffed, teeth scraping the lollipop, “But they said they were just playing!”

“How do you know they weren’t?” the principal said calmly, blinking slowly at Michael when he tensed and narrowed his eyes.

Ray winced and rubbed his forehead when Michael folded his arms and slumped down in his chair. “Uh, if I can jus-“ he began, wincing when the principal shot him a look.

“No, he can tell me,” the principal said, looking back at Michael. Ray sighed as Michael looked away.

After a tense moment the principal sighed and looked at his desk. Ray quickly squeezed Michael’s shoulder and gave him a reassuring smile. Pouting, Michael huffed and pulled the lollipop from his mouth. “They were being mean,” he said, voice getting small when the principal looked up suddenly, “Jeremy was crying and they were saying mean things about how short he was.”

The principal nodded slowly, rubbing his chin. His bald head glinted in the light as Ray gave Michael another smile. He tensed when Michael reached up and grabbed his hand. The principal didn’t seem to notice so he squeezed Michael’s hand, rubbing his thumb over the back of the small hand.

“Can you tell me the other kids involved,” the principal said, waving for Ray to leave when the bell ending recess rang.

Reluctantly, he let go of Michael’s hand with another reassuring smile and slipped from the room. Michael didn’t returned until much later in the day and after the intercom had called a few other children to the main office.

As Michael sat next to Jeremy, who was in such a rush to hug him that he nearly toppled both of them over, Ray could see the kids not directly involved but friends with those who were glaring at him. Sighing, he ran a hand through his hair and planned another bullying lecture.

“How’s his eye?” Ray asked Ryan later, over the phone. An empty foam container of instant ramen in front of him. His stomach was still protesting the sudden drop in the quality of the food he was stuffing in his face.

“It’s definitely better, but it’ll be swollen for a while,” Ryan sighed, the soft tick of silverware on plates echoing over the line. Michael was in trouble for getting in a fight although Ryan reassured him that he was glad that he defended his friend. He had dinner early and was grounded for the rest of that night only. Gavin had followed after him and they were definitely playing upstairs although they weren’t supposed to be.

“I can’t believe they didn’t do anything when he got the teacher,” Ray sighed, leaning back against his chair. Another one of Ryan’s shirts hung from his shoulders, this one still faintly smelled like him.

“I’m just glad everything worked out,” Ryan said, a yawn escaping him.

Ray frowned and ran his hand through his hair, foot coming up to rest against the edge of the table. “Maybe you should get to bed, Rye. You sound tired.”

“I’m exhausted,” Ryan groaned, chair creaking in the background, “Works been a mess then this happened.”

“Sorry,” Ray said softly, pulling at the bottom of the shirt.

“For what? You’ve done everything you could Ray,” Ryan said, the chair creaking again before the hiss of water coming out of a faucet.

“I could be doing more,” Ray grumbled before shaking his head, “Sorry, I-just. Sorry.”

“St-it’s okay,” Ryan said, letting the water run to fill the heavy silence between them.

Ray closed his eyes and took a deep breath. “So, how many people have you murdered in Dead by Daylight?”

Ryan laughed and Ray felt himself relax. “I’ve lost count,” Ryan said before describing one particularly glitchy game. The tension bleed out of them as they talked. By the time they bid each other goodnight they were both smiling.

The fighting didn’t stop, however. At least once a week, just as Michael’s bruises and scratches were starting to look good, he would get into another fight. He was always brought to Ray who would have to take him to the office.

Every time, the same group of kids would be bullying someone and Michael would get a teacher who wouldn’t do anything and then step in himself. The principal and Ryan both gave up on trying to punish him. Ray gave his bullying lecture, which kept his class out of the mess minus poor Michael.

The principal, every time Ray would press the issue, would say an investigation into the teacher whose kids were the source of the problem was underway. However, absolutely nothing was actually being done. The entire second grade knew. They could hear her loud and rowdy class all day.

Ray did eventually get himself and the teacher switched for duty hours. Once Ray began monitoring recess hours, the fighting ended all together. Any student would just have to look at Ray in complete fear and he would be there putting an end to the problem.

Without constant fights holding bad publicity over his head, the principal stopped trying to convince Ray he was doing anything at all about the other teacher.

“I just don’t get it!” Ray snarled into the phone one evening. His red grading pen was trembling in his hand, “Everything was perfectly fine last year!”

“This is that Tilton woman, right?” Ryan said, the worry in his voice making Ray pause mid grading.

“Yeah, she was a perfectly fine teacher last year,” Ray said, making his eyes focus on the paper in front of him.

“Isn’t she retiring?” Ryan said and the line was so silent that he actually held the phone away from his face to make sure the call hadn’t ended, “Ray?”

Ray’s head slammed into his desk and he groaned loudly. Ryan chuckled as Ray continued to groan. “Fuck,” Ray hissed just as he ran out of air.

“Guess that solves that mystery. And why the principal isn’t willing to do anything,” Ryan said as Ray started groaning again, “Come on, you have things to grade.”

Ray huffed a sighed, making himself sit up. The paper stuck to his skin slightly, peeling off of his forehead and floating back onto the table. He stared at the paper for a moment before slumping in his chair. “I’m going to kill that woman.”

“That probably wouldn’t end well,” Ryan said, grunting as he shifted slightly.

“You know how to hide a body, right?” Ray said, smiling as Ryan laughed.

“Hypothetically, yes. I know how to hide a body,” Ryan said as Ray continued grading.

“A hypothetically can become reality,” Ray chuckled, moving onto the next math test, “Under the right circumstances.”

“As much as I could and kind of want to, do you really want to open that can of worms? I mean. Once I start, I might not stop,” Ryan said, his head shaking and bumping the phone.

“We can handle that when it happens,” Ray said, nodding to himself.

Ryan snorted and laughed. “How about we not?”

“How about we do anyway?” Ray shot back, leaning back in his chair. He smiled as Ryan laughed again.

* * *

 

With the fighting stopped and the Tilton classroom finally quieted down after Ray had a private conversation with the woman, the year was surprisingly quiet. Ray didn’t let himself hope too much for a completely peaceful rest of the year. Although, he was beginning to think was about to get one when Gavin burst into Ray’s glass room red faced and panting hard, eyes wide and scared.

“Gavvy?” Michael said, slowly standing as Gavin’s eyes darted around the room until they found Ray. With a burst of energy, he bolted into the room, darted around the desks and slammed into Ray, clinging to him as snot and tears soaked his face.

“Gavin?” Ray said, kneeling down and gently holding Gavin’s shoulders, “What’s wrong?”

“S-she-office. Can’t- she was-“ Gavin sobbed, face scrunched up as he rubbed at his eyes with his small fists. He shook slightly as Ray’s brow furrowed.

“Who?” Ray said gently, glancing at his class which was slowly getting up to watch. Michael was pushing past his peers to get to them. The instant he was close enough, Gavin was clinging to both him and Ray.

“Don’t-she can’t- don’t let her hurt us,” Gavin managed to rasp out before pressing his face into Ray’s shoulder.

Ray opened his mouth then snapped his jaw closed again. With a bit of a struggle since Gavin was having sudden growth spurts, he gathered both boys up in his arms and stood. “Davis!” he said, weaving through his students to look into the classroom next to his, “I need you to watch my class!”

Vaguely explaining that there was a problem to the teacher in the classroom next to his, he rushed to the office with Michael and Gavin in his arms since both boys refused to let go. When he got into the office the first person he saw was a tall woman with wide green eyes, long black hair carefully tied back, and a nice suit snug along her curves.

“Oh, there they are!” the woman said, heels clicking as she rushed over to Ray, “Thank you for bringing them both here!”

Ray stumbled back, shooting panicked looks to the little old lady that ran the front desk. Catching his eye, she stood and quickly rounded her desk, grabbing the woman’s arm. “Sorry, miss, I need you to sign the boys out.”

“Oh, very well,” the woman grinned at poor, little, old Margaret before turning toward the desk.

Margaret waved Ray on as she started pulling random, long forms from her desk. Ray quickly snuck past, heart in his throat and the boys clinging to him. Gavin was trembling while Michael stared at everything with wide, confused eyes.

“Boss,” Ray hissed, slipping into the principal’s office, kicking the door closed behind him, “We have a very big problem.”

“Mr. Narvaez? What’s going on?” the principal said, standing from his chair, “Why do you have the Haywood boys?”

Ray took a shaky breath and sat down in the padded chair in front of his desk. “There’s a woman out there trying to sign the boys out,” he said slowly, holding them tighter when Gavin whimpered and Michael tried to ask him what was going on, “I’m fairly certain she’s claiming that she’s their mother.”

“Is she not?” the principal said, brow furrowing as he slowly sat down.

“There is no Mrs. Haywood,” Ray hissed, letting the boys drop to sit in his lap, “Mr. Haywood as full custody and a restraining order out on her.”

The principal’s eyes widened and he was standing again. He snatched up his phone and jabbed at the buttons. “Hello? Paul? It’s me. Yes. We need you here, _now_ ,” he hissed into the phone.

Ray slowly relaxed until there was a knock on the door. Gavin, who had been calming down himself, was suddenly sent into another panic as Michael clung to him tightly. The principal scowled and placed his hand over the phone’s mouthpiece. “Come in!”

Margaret slipped into the room, closing the door quickly behind her. “What’s going on?” she said, frowning at Ray.

“Keep that woman from leaving,” the principal hissed as Ray tried to keep the boy’s calm. Margaret looked between all of them before taking a deep breath and leaving the office again.

“Stay here,” the principal told Ray once he was off the phone. A moment later, he left the room, leaving Ray with two crying, scared, and confused boys.

Giving them a shaking smile, Ray ran his fingers through their hair and pressed kisses against their foreheads. “It’s okay, I’m not going to let anyone hurt you,” he whispered as he leaned forward and took tissues from the principal’s desk.

He wiped their tears and had them blow their noses before hugging them close and humming what songs he remembered Ryan singing to them at night. They were startled about an hour later when the principal came back into the room a long, bloody scratch running the length of his cheek which was covered in a red handprint.

The principal wobbled into the room and dropped into his chair. “She’s been arrested,” he said quietly, taking a tissue himself to press against his cheek, “I’m glad you stopped this before something bad happened.”

Ray frowned and rubbed Gavin’s back. He was half asleep and probably didn’t need to be awake for this. Michael was wide awake, looking between them with his lips pressed into a tight line.

“Gavin ran into my classroom, was he called down?” Ray said, gently squeezing Michael.

“He was,” the principal nodded, folding his hands on top of his desk, “When he saw her he bolted from the room.”

Ray nodded and leaned back, closing his eyes. He could remember the picture Ryan showed him of their wedding day. He had hid all of the photos away or burned them a long time ago, but Gavin still had nightmares of the faint memories of the woman.

“Did Mr. Haywood warn you that she might come for them?” the principal said after a moment.

“Yes,” Ray said, sitting up and opened his eyes, “He mentioned she might pop up when I was Gavin’s teacher.”

The principal nodded and sat back. “Well, Margaret is calling their father now. You can stay with them until he comes or go back to class.”

“I don’t think I’m going anywhere any time soon,” Ray said softly, smiling down at the boys. Gavin was fast asleep and Michael had his eyes closed as he snuggled into Ray’s shoulder.

The principal nodded and gave him a tired smile. Ray carefully moved them out into the main office to wait for Ryan. Before long, Ryan burst into the room, heart falling out of his chest and breathing hard.

His eyes darted around until he found Ray holding both Michael and Gavin who were woken by the door slamming open. “Dad?” Gavin slurred, blinking up at Ryan.

“Dad!” Michael gasped sitting up in Ray’s arms.

Ryan breathed out a harsh breath as he sunk to knees and took both boys into his arms. Ray smiled gently as they hugged each other tightly. A few tears slipped down Ryan’s cheeks. Margaret cleared her throat and gestured at Ryan when Ray looked up, purposefully looking away.

Ray would bet real money that Monty had told her, but he was too tired to even bother to wonder who he would even make that bet with. Instead he reached out and ran his fingers through Ryan’s hair.

Ryan’s head snapped up and he gave Ray a broken smile as Michael mumbled what happened against his chest and Gavin sobbed. Ray smiled back and rested his forehead against Ryan’s.

Ryan’s sobbed a laugh and slowly sat next to Ray, boys in his lap. He stayed until he was calmed down enough to drive. “The police will call you later, dearie,” Margaret said as Ryan stood with the boys sleeping once again.

Ryan nodded at her and looked at Ray. “Thank you,” he said before mouthing to Ray that he better be at the house that night.

Nodding, Ray saw them out of the school and made sure they drove away alright before finally returning to his class. They were merged with Davis’s class, quietly doing a drawing activity until Ray walked into the room in his tear soaked shirt and shaking hands.

They all demanded to know what happened but with one tired, stern look from Ray, they stopped asking. The rest of the day was quiet and went smoothly, despite Ray’s trembling voice and fidgeting.

Once the students had all left, he managed to convince Monty to give him a ride to Ryan’s house, almost entirely because he was afraid to be alone at a bus stop. He didn’t even get a chance to knock on the door when the red wood was thrown open and Ryan was yanking him into the house.

The instant the door was closed, Ray was pressed up against the door, Ryan hugging him tightly. Ray smiled and hugged him tightly, pressing his face into his shoulder. Ryan began to shake slightly and Ray ran his fingers through his hair slowly.

“Thank you, thank you, thank you,” Ryan whispered over and over again, a few more tears soaking Ray’s shirt.

Smiling, Ray pushed Ryan further into the house and onto the couch. He wrapped himself around his head and gently kissed his hair as Ryan slowly calmed down. “I could never let anything happen to the boys,” Ray said softly as Ryan sniffed and loosened his hold on Ray slightly.

Ryan nodded, leaning back slightly to look up at Ray. “I know,” he rasped, smiling slowly. His cheeks were tight with tears, snot smeared under his nose. “I’m just glad you’re all alright.”

Ray chuckled and slid down slightly to kiss Ryan. He pulled back and ignored the salty taste on his lips as Ryan smiled at him. “Where are they?”

“Sleeping,” Ryan sighed, closing his eyes and pressing their foreheads together, “They were so tired.”

Ray nodded slightly and they stayed there until Michael thumped down the stairs and crawled on top of them, asking when they would have dinner. Ryan laughed and left Michael with Ray as he wandered into the kitchen to cook something.

Ray followed after him, Michael propped up on his hip. “We’re ordering something,” he said, pulling the pot out of Ryan’s hand.

“Pizza!” Michael said, smiling tiredly at them.

“There, perfect,” Ray said smiling at Ryan as he looked between them, “We’re ordering pizza.”

“Pepperoni?” Gavin’s small, rough voice said from the doorway. Ryan was there in an instant to scoop him up into his arms.

“Pepperoni pizza it is,” Ryan sighed, smiling at all of them as Gavin gave a tired cheer, resting his head on Ryan’s shoulder.

* * *

 

The woman was jailed for attempted kidnapping and breaking her restraining order. Stories flew around the students about what happened, but no one was really certain. The teachers had to go through training days to better handle situations like this. Had Gavin not fled from the office, well, they didn’t want to think about that.

As the school year came to a close, Ray’s things started appearing randomly in the Haywood home again. By the end of the year, another massive poster was added to Ray’s collection of drawings and Ray told his landlord that once the lease was up, he would be moved out.

Another, older couch was added to the Haywood living room while an entire shelving unit was added next to the TV for all of Ray’s games. A place in the basement was set aside for Ray’s classroom decorations while Ryan’s closet held clothes for two. The rest of Ray’s furniture was sold since they had no need for two fridges and two king size beds.

The summer was spent teaching Ray how to cook real meals and drive, long family vacations taking up much of the rest. Ray got the boys ready for the next grade while Ryan’s gaming skills got better.

When the next school year began, Ray welcomed his new students with a warm smile. Then, when the kids all left, his boys sat in his classroom and played with the toys once their homework was finished until Ray was ready to go home.

They shuffled into their home, tired. They were welcomed warmly by Ryan who ruffled the boy’s hairs and kissed Ray’s cheek. Their dragging feet would get a new step as the boys ran off to play games while Ray trailed after Ryan into the kitchen.

While the dining room was set for their meal, Ray claimed the kitchen table, filling the round, old wood with piles and piles of papers to grade and read. Ryan would finish their diner, the two of them talking quietly about their days.

The four of them would eat a warm diner before Ray would finish his work while Ryan helped the boys with the homework Ray couldn’t figure out. If there was no homework left, he would play video or board games with them until Ray wandered in and collapsed on the couch.

Netflix would be brought up on the TV and they would watch a movie Michael wanted to watch then one Gavin wanted to see. By the end of the movie, the boys would be tired and would be herded off to bed with soft kisses on their foreheads. Ray would read them a story then Ryan would sing a few songs.

Ray and Ryan would slip from their rooms and collapse on the couch once again, Ray curled up on Ryan’s chest. They would just lay there and breathe, relaxing and loving the silence. Ryan would rub knots in Ray’s back while Ray pressed soft kisses against Ryan’s collarbone and neck.

Some show or another would play in the background as they silently hoped for the weekend. Eventually one of them would grunt and laugh softly. They would talk softly until Ray, usually, fell asleep and Ryan would drag them upstairs. Settled in more comfortable clothes and under heavy covers, they would settled into sleep with tired smiles and tangled together.


End file.
